than because of the temperature. He was painting; he needed nothing else. He knew what he was and what he wanted to do, whereas I was sinking into a sea of uncertainty. In the morning I destroyed what I had built up during the previous evening. I did silly things that afterward I was ashamed of. I made up for them with difficulty, and then ended up doing them again. I moved in a vicious cycle. No, my portrait brought me no blessings. The Muslims are right: to depict the human image brings bad luck.
Between the painter and I there was a shadow. I did not forgive Francisco. Why did I have to forgive him if forgiveness is a sign of one’s own weakness, if forgiveness is giving in? And he . . . Again I noticed the old recrimination in his eyes. One night he said to me: “You are a witch.”
The same word, the same charge used by the mother of my husband on the day he was buried.
“Why?” I whispered in the darkness.
“You put a spell on my daughter. My little Pilar is dead. Just as you did with your husband. And now with me. What am I doing here?”
“I don’t understand you.”
“What am I doing here? Now that I have completed your portrait, I paint little. I simply stare, eat, and drink more than I should, and pay no attention to my obligations.”
“You can go, if you wish.”
He embraced me in the darkness.
“Don’t tell me that. You know that I cannot.”
“But you wish to, do you not?”
“Yes. But I will not do it.”
“You will.”
“I cannot, I tell you. I cannot.”
“You will see all right.”
“Perhaps, who knows.”
I now felt as if all of me had turned into black marble. For quite a while I was unable to recover: I trembled, I had shivers, I don’t know if I was suffering from a love that was never to be, or if I was starting to relish a new victory.
“I am suffering, Teresa. Can you not see it?”
“But why?” I asked in a low voice.
“I cannot go on living like this. I need some form of security.”
“Do you not have me?”
“No, it isn’t that.”
“Are we lacking something, perhaps?”
“I do not feel well.”
“But why?” I whispered again in the night.
“I need some form of security.”
“Like what?”
“If we live together, we ought to marry.”
I burst out laughing, a strident laugh, full of victory.
“Evil witch!” he spat in the darkness.
He took me in a violent fashion, as if he wanted to punish me. I heard a few sobs. Then he went quickly to his bedroom.
He was mine.
Really? No, with that man such a thing was not possible. He wants to go, after all! He himself has admitted it.
He wants to go? Very well, he shall go then, I thought. But first he will experience certain things. The Duchess of Alba does not let herself be tortured so easily. The duchess is a woman who, when she enters a salon, stops the music. And the man who can torture her without being punished for it has not yet been born.
I sat down at my desk and wrote a letter to Manuel Godoy, prime minister and lover of the queen, asking him to leave everything and to come and see me at once, to keep absolutely quiet about the existence of this letter, and not to be surprised at anything he might see when he arrives.
“María, come here. Closer, talking aloud tires me. That’s right, come closer. The concert was no good. Didn’t you hear how out of tune they were? It is as if since the death of Don José music has fallen into a decline. Nothing can be listened to. Do you know what I want now? I want Juan and Manuela to dance a fandango for me. A very fiery fandango. Listen, María, do you remember the Coto de la Doña Ana? And our Palacio del Rocío?”
“Yes, and the magnificent portrait of Your Highness, which the royal painter did at that time. I still don’t understand why milady didn’t take it.”
“What? The picture or the man?”
“I am talking about the picture, milady.”
“Why have you gone all red? My good woman! Why did I not take it? That is my business, María. What I really regret is not having kept that man.”
“There are few men like the royal painter. Apart from the fact that he believes in demons and witches and paints winged monsters. But on the other hand, he carries an